Robin: Martian Child
by MissScorp
Summary: Somewhere along the way he learned that an alien could love a creature and be loved by one in return. One-shot, K for hurt/comfort. Complete.


**A/N:** Hello m'dears and welcome!

Please, if you like this story, favorite/follow it. And reviews are dearly cherished :)

* * *

"Why are you here?" Bruce growled at the woman standing in front of him. "What is it that you want, Talia?"

"I have come to collect my son. It is time for him to give up this charade and assume his rightful place as the grandson of the Demon."

"No."

Talia flipped her long hair over her shoulder and fixed her beloved with a superior feminine look. "Do not think to keep my son from me, my love."

Bruce folded his arms across his chest and fixed Talia with a stern glare. "Do not think I will let you take Damian just so you can use him in your plans to cleanse the world."

Talia laughed tonelessly. "I have much brighter plans for my son than just merely having him help with the cleansing of this city."

Bruce's eyes narrowed in keen speculation and vexation. "You mean to have Ra's name Damian as his heir."

"Father's time is short and he has no sons. He needs a man to assume his position once he is gone. My son has proven himself to be a more than worthy replacement as the Head of the Demon."

"Do not test me, Talia."

"Or you will do what, beloved?" Talia said coyly, her lips curving into a smile that was both seductive as it was amused. "Kill me? We both know you will never do that. It goes against your personal ethics to kill." Her eyes glinted like green glass and her voice dropped to a hiss. "Even if the person in question deserves death for the chaos they have wrought."

"Do not make the mistake of thinking that I will not stop you from taking Damian," Bruce rasped. "I will do whatever is necessary to keep him from becoming twisted by yours and your father's madness."

"He is my son and his place is with me!"

Bruce's face became hard as stone. "His place is here with his family."

Talia scoffed and waved a hand dismissively. "Beloved, this is why I demand that my son be returned to me. He languishes in your shadow as much as he does in those who were your protégés before him. As the heir of the Demon he will only have one shadow to live up to. And he will be given the worthy mission of purifying this planet, to restoring it to its former beauty... a mission I will brook no interference in. Now, bring my son to me."

"No."

* * *

Neither parent was aware that the son they were currently arguing over was at that very moment perched high above them, and listening to every word being spoken. His mother's words were like an arrow digging into his breastbone. Thin droplets of blood dripped from the invisible wound. Damian drew his knees into his chest and dropped his chin down upon them as he continued listening to the bickering going on below his perch. He wasn't surprised by his mother coming here to collect him. Not anymore than he was surprised that she now wanted him to be named as his grandfather's heir.

A part of Damian (a part which he kept buried deep within him) wished his mother could see him for who he was, and not for what he most represented to her: a weapon. It was ridiculous though to expect she'd ever see him as anything other than her greatest creation. His mother only noticed him whenever he was part of the team threatening to stop one of her plans from coming to fruition. She only needed him when it served to either hurt or distract his father. Quite simply, his mother was not the kind of mother to sit at his bedside and sing to him just because it made him feel better. She was not the kind of mother who'd rub his back as he threw up or burned from the inside out with fever. She wouldn't read him his favorite books aloud while he recovered from having his tonsils removed, or sit through every Jet Li and Jackie Chan film in creation, or...

or...

or...

Every thought fled when warm arms draped around him and drew him close. He didn't have to think hard about whom it was that was holding him. _Raya_, he thought even as his body tensed in an automatic response to her slipping her arms around him.

"What are you doing here?" he mumbled in a monotone. "I thought Father told you to stay upstairs."

She chose to ignore his question and whispered, "I love you," in that melodious voice which always chased away the shadows hanging over his heart. "Never forget that, Dami. _I_ love _you_."

He didn't react to her statement with his typical _how-dare-you-speak-to-me-like-that-attitude_. Nor did he jerk out of her embrace and go stomping upstairs while hurling threats over his shoulder. Oh, no, he didn't do anything of things. Because he needed to be held like this. Because he desperately needed to hear those words, to know someone loved him because he was him and not just some instrument of destruction. Not that it mattered whether he confirmed or denied what he needed or wanted. He knew Raya got it. She always got it. For some reason, she just seemed to get _him_.

She brushed her fingers through his hair and placed a gentle kiss to his temple. Something else his mother never did, he thought as long-buried resentment and hurt whipped through his body like a hurricane. She'd never have thought it important to show him this type of warmth and affection. She'd only scoff if someone told her she had a duty to nurture his heart as much as his brain. She'd say he was an assassin, an elite specimen of genetic perfection and so had no need for such trivial things as _mothering_.

Then again, it was not like his mother realized she had any sort of responsibility for his upbringing. She'd simply dumped him into his father's care and walked away without a backwards glance. She wasn't involved in any aspect of his day to day care and upbringing. She wasn't involved in his schooling as either Robin or as Bruce Wayne's son. She'd washed her hands of him the moment the tutors and assassins she'd hired to teach and train him were through giving him his rudimentary instruction.

It routinely amazed him how a woman who held several advanced degrees in biology could be so absolutely clueless about parenting. She had absolutely no clue about putting _his_ needs ahead of her own. Doing what was best for _him_ was a foreign conception to Talia al Ghul. She only protected him when it suited _her_ purposes. She certainly only used her team of scientists and doctors to heal him not because he was her son, but her finest creation. She had no idea about love having no conditions attached to it. That it came without reservations, without strings. For all that Talia al Ghul liked to proclaim to the world she was his _mother_, she most definitely was not much of one.

No, his mother wasn't the woman who was currently sitting on a narrow iron ledge with her arms wrapped around him, trying her best to shelter him from the ugliness and pain of his mother's rejection. His mother wasn't the one who'd instinctively known she was needed and came down into the cave in order to protect him. His mother wasn't the woman silently giving him what he needed and asking him for nothing in return. Yeah, Talia al Ghul may have been his mother, but she most definitely was not the woman he thought of as _mom_. His _mom_ was this warm and real woman who smelled like the air after a summer rainstorm. His mom was the one who was always waiting for him with a smile, with a hug (that he'd feign disdain for, of course), with a kind word or a teasing comment. His _mom_ was the woman who was going to be there when he woke up in the morning and who was there when he went to sleep at night.

"C'mon," Raya whispered in his ear. "Let's go upstairs. We can watch _Martian Child_ and eat the cookies I just pulled from the oven."

Yeah, his mother had no clue what his favorite movie was, or why. Raya knew the reason _why_ though. She'd known it even before he'd told her it was his favorite movie. _She says I am like Dennis, _he thought even as the argument between his mother and father became more heated._ She says I am this little alien who came into her life when she least expected it, and most desperately needed it. She says I was this bundle of raw energy and pure potential who was not only on a mission to become Robin, but to find out what it meant to be part of a family as well. She not only taught me about family, but that an alien can love a creature and be loved in return. Without there being any reservations or conditions attached._

"Peanut butter?" he asked her in a small, hopeful voice.

He felt her smile against his skin. "And oatmeal raisin. I know you've acquired a taste for them lately."

"All right," he said. However, neither of them made a move to get up. Quietly, Raya began to sing to him, the song the one she always sang to him when she knew he was sad. It was a song that was _his_ and _his_ alone. Damian partially turned and burrowed his face against the curve of her shoulder, letting her soft, bluesy voice and physical warmth chase away his darkness.


End file.
